11 Best Online Course Platforms – Which Is Top Dog?

Becoming a digital course creator has never been easier thanks to online course software.

But at the same time, there are still so many potential pitfalls that could seriously harm your business. And one thing’s for sure: There’s a lot more of them if you’re on a platform that is not suited to your course.

That’s why in this article, we’re going to dissect the best online course platforms to help you find one that will assist in growing your online course business.

Best Platforms To Sell Online Courses

Here’s our list of the best online course builders:

• Skool
• GoHighLevel
• SamCart
• Podia
• Kajabi 
• Thinkific
• ClickFunnels
• Teachable
• Skillshare
• Thrive Apprentice

Let’s get to it!

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1. Skool (best overall)

Skool is more than just an online course platform; it’s a vibrant community hub designed to transform the e-learning landscape.

At its core, Skool is engineered to facilitate interactive learning, making it stand out in the digital education space.

With its user-friendly interface, Skool simplifies the creation and management of courses, enabling educators to focus on what they do best: teaching and inspiring.

What Skool Does Well

Skool shines in its ability to foster engagement and collaboration among its users.

Its integrated community features allow students to interact, discuss, and learn from each other, creating a dynamic learning environment that extends beyond traditional lecture-style education.

This platform is adept at hosting a variety of courses, from professional development workshops to comprehensive academic classes, making it a versatile choice for educators and learners alike.

Limitations of Skool

While Skool is innovative in its approach to community-based learning, it may not suit everyone.

Its emphasis on interactive, community-driven learning could be overwhelming for learners who prefer a more straightforward, self-paced course structure.

Additionally, while its tools and features are robust, it might lack some of the advanced analytics and customization options available on more specialized platforms.

Who is Skool Best For?

Skool is an ideal platform for entrepreneurs, business owners, and online course creators who aim to build more than just courses — they aim to build communities.

Its community-centric approach is perfect for those looking to engage audiences deeply, fostering loyalty and interactive learning environments.

Educators looking to break free from traditional teaching methods will find Skool’s tools for creating dynamic, engaging courses invaluable. However, it might not suit those focused solely on delivering highly specialized content without the need for interaction or who require advanced analytics for tracking learning outcomes.

In essence, Skool shines for those prioritizing community engagement and interactive learning over traditional, lecture-based approaches.

Skool Pricing

Skool likes to keep their pricing simple with just one plan:

Standard plan – $99/month

• Includes 1 group, all features, unlimited courses, and unlimited members.
• Transaction fee: 2.9%

Skool 14-Day Free Trial

Skool also offers a risk free 14-day trial, meaning you can try out all features of Skool free of charge for 14 days. If you dont like it, just cancel before your 14 days are up and you won’t be billed.

Otherwise, if you love the platform, then do nothing and you’ll be shifted onto the monthly payment plan of $99 per month after your 14 day trial.

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2. GoHighLevel (all-in-one platform)

GoHighLevel is an amazing software tool for businesses to handle online marketing and sales. It’s perfect for anyone looking to grow their business online.

What’s really cool about GoHighLevel is its course creation feature. It lets you easily turn your knowledge and skills into an online course. This is super useful if you want to teach people online or set up a membership site.

Creating a course with GoHighLevel is simple, so you don’t need to be a tech expert. It’s an all-in-one platform, meaning you can create, market, and sell your course all in the same place.

You also get to make your course look just how you want, which makes it unique and engaging for your students. Plus, GoHighLevel isn’t just for courses; you can also build membership sites, giving your students a special place to access all your content.

One of the best parts is that GoHighLevel lets you keep track of how your students are doing. This helps you understand your audience better and improve your courses.

Who Is GoHighLevel Best For?

GoHighLevel is an ideal tool for content creators focused on digital marketing and sales, particularly educators, coaches, influencers, and agencies.

This platform simplifies creating and selling online courses, perfect for experts eager to share knowledge in any field. Its user-friendly interface allows for easy course and membership site creation, without needing advanced tech skills.

For coaches and consultants, GoHighLevel streamlines client management and session scheduling, coupled with effective CRM and marketing tools. Influencers and bloggers benefit from its capabilities to monetize their audience through exclusive content offerings.

Agencies and freelancers find value in GoHighLevel’s white-label feature, enabling them to offer branded services to clients. It’s more than just a content platform; it’s a comprehensive tool for building and scaling an online content-based business.

GoHighLevel Pricing

GoHighLevel offers simple and straightforward pricing plans:

Starter Plan – $97/month

• Essential features for lead capture and nurturing.
• Includes full online booking, pipelines, social calendar, website builder, and more.
• Unlimited contacts and users.
• Allows setup of up to three sub-accounts​​.

Unlimited Plan – $297/month

• Includes everything in the Starter Plan.
• Offers API access for integration with various platforms.
• Provides unlimited sub-accounts for client management.
• Features a branded desktop app with custom domains for complete platform customization​​.

GoHighLevel Annual Discount

If you want to save more money, then you can get two months free when you opt for a GoHighLevel annual plan.

GoHighLevel 14-Day Free Trial

GoHighLevel also has a free 14-day trial. This means you can use all the features the platform has to offer completely free of charge for 14 days.

This gives you time to see if GoHighLevel is truly the right tool for you and your business before you commit to purchasing.

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3. SamCart (best for cross-selling)

SamCart has been one of the most popular shopping cart platforms for quite a long time now. But up until recently, you would have to integrate a third-party online course platform with it.

Now SamCart has launched its new Courses App – with the goal to solve the issues that other online course platforms have.

Since SamCart is primarily known as a shopping cart tool, we were skeptical at first. However, the new SamCart courses app is pretty awesome!

Besides allowing you to provide an excellent online learning experience to your audience, it also has some great automation tools and features to help you sell more in the process.

The platform can actually do quite a lot of things. If you want to know more about its other features, you can read about some SamCart use case examples here.

Pros

• Incredibly easy to use 
• VERY affordable, considering SamCart has not increased its prices since adding this feature
• Create unlimited courses
• Unlimited student
• Create different membership plans
• Upsells and cross-selling features
• Excellent engagement tools
• Includes some of the best Cart features on the planet
• Built-in affiliate management
• Lots of third-party integrations
• Annual plan discounts (20% off)
• 14-day free trial

Cons:

• The feature is new, which could be a potential negative because of bugs… But I haven’t seen any complaints
• Some of the best sales features are not available on the starter plan 

Who Is SamCart Best For?

SamCart is best for most small business owners and solopreneurs mainly because of its ease of use. A lot of other online course builders can get annoyingly technical and have clunky builders.

SamCart, on the other hand, is straightforward and simple to work with.

Besides this, SamCart is known for its highly effective conversion features. And now, with the new SamCart courses app you can use the cross-sell feature to help you increase your revenue.

If you’re not familiar with cross-selling, basically it’s a powerful feature that you can use within the course builder to show your course members other products that you offer.

SamCart stylishly shows your course members your other products at just the right time to entice them to purchase more from you.

Using this feature alone can increase your revenue considerably, which is why we like it!

Besides, it’s also excellent for any business owner or entrepreneur who wants to leverage advanced shopping cart tools like:

• One-click upsells and downsells
• Cross-selling
• Two-step carts
•  Order bumps

SamCart Pricing

SamCart gives you all the core features on every plan – so you will be able to host your courses on the $49 launch plan. However, some of the advanced sales tools are only available on the premium plan.

• Launch: $49 per month 
• Grow: $99 per month 
• Scale: $199 per month 

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4. ThriveCart (ThriveLearn)

ThriveLearn is the course creation and delivery platform integrated within ThriveCart, a popular checkout and sales solution.

ThriveLearn allows users to host and manage their courses, making it an ideal tool for those who want an all-in-one platform to handle both sales and course delivery.

The platform emphasizes ease of use and provides robust student tracking and engagement features.

What’s Unique About ThriveLearn?

ThriveLearn integrates directly with ThriveCart’s powerful sales and marketing tools, making it stand out for those who want seamless integration between checkout, affiliate marketing, and course hosting. ThriveLearn offers:

• Customizable course structure: Build and structure courses with a simple drag-and-drop interface.
• Student tracking & engagement: Monitor student progress with detailed analytics.
• Quizzes & assessments: Test student understanding with built-in quizzes.
• Drip content: Release modules over time to keep students engaged.
• Video hosting: No need for third-party video platforms, as ThriveLearn allows direct hosting of course videos.

Where ThriveLearn Falls Short

Although ThriveLearn is highly effective for those already using ThriveCart, it lacks the advanced design flexibility and interactive features of other platforms like Kajabi or Teachable. The focus on simplicity may leave some course creators wanting more customization options.

Who Is ThriveLearn For?

ThriveLearn is perfect for entrepreneurs and creators already using ThriveCart to sell products or services and looking for a straightforward, affordable way to create and deliver courses. Its integration with ThriveCart’s affiliate and checkout tools is a strong benefit, particularly for those focusing on maximizing their sales funnel.

ThriveLearn Pros & Cons

Pros:

• Seamless integration with ThriveCart’s checkout and sales tools.
• No ongoing subscription fees.
• Easy to use, with built-in progress tracking and quizzes.

Cons:

• Limited customization and design options compared to other platforms.
• Lacks advanced community features.

ThriveLearn Pricing

• One of ThriveLearn’s major advantages is its pricing. ThriveLearn is included with the purchase of ThriveCart, which operates on a lifetime deal instead of the recurring subscription models seen in most other course platforms.
• While the upfront cost may be higher, it could offer significant long-term savings, especially for creators focused on selling and delivering courses over a long period.

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4. Podia (most affordable all-in-one)

Podia is an affordable all-in-one online teaching platform that will let you create and market your educational material, and host your online classes.

The cool thing about it is that it gives you the key features that most other competitors charge DOUBLE or TRIPLE for… While also being user-friendly.

Their goal is quite similar to SamCarts: To take the technical headaches out of creating an online course so you can focus on what you’re best at.

Podia Pros and Cons

Pros: 

• It’s very affordable compared to competitors like Kajabi
• It lets you host and sell webinars as well
• You can also sell coaching with Podia 
• You can create a community for your students
• It comes with added marketing tools like affiliate management, a custom website, and email marketing.

Cons:

• The email marketing tool leaves room for improvement
• The platform isn’t suited if you want to scale past 50k email subscribers because that’s the max email recipients
• There isn’t as much customization as on other platforms

Who Is Podia Best For? 

Podia is best for beginners and new course creators. While the platform is very straightforward to use and also affordable – it does lack some of the advanced customization and sales features of competitors.

However, most small business owners won’t necessarily need them or may even find them confusing. 

So if you’re into simplicity, Podia is for you. 

Podia Pricing

Podia has three main price plans: 

• Mover $39/MO – What you need to know: No ability to remove branding, no affiliate management systems, 5k email contacts
• Shaker $79/MO 15k email contacts
• Earthquaker $179/MO- Everything podia has to offer

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5. Kajabi (best for customization)

Kajabi is one of the top dogs of the course creator platforms and has been so for a while. Why? 

Because it simply has some of the most advanced customization, branding, and marketing tools on the market – allowing you to create a better experience for your students and sell more courses.

Kajabi Pros and Cons

Pros: 

• Arguably the best experience for your students because of the amount of customization you can add
• The software and hosting can handle large amounts of traffic
• It comes with some great marketing tools like a website builder and email marketing software
• You can plan your campaigns via the Pipeline feature
• It has excellent sales tools
• Drip content
• Mobile app your users can use to watch your content
• Excellent engagement tools
• You can host your video content on Wistia for free with Kajabi

Cons:

• It’s pretty costly compared to competitors like Podia
• It can be a little overwhelming because of the amount of customization you have
• The email marketing feature has room for improvement

Who is Kajabi best for? 

Kajabi is best for established course creators with an audience that is looking to scale. Since Kajabi is a cloud-based learning management system, it’s designed to handle large amounts of traffic.

Kajabi also has advanced engagement tools and branding features too.

Kajabi Pricing

Kajabi has three main pricing plans: 

• Basic: $149 per month (Kajabi branding, no affiliate program, limited resources)
• Growth $199 per month (More resources, no Kajabi branding, affiliate program)
• PRO: $399 per month (Max resources + code editor)

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6. Thinkific (best free plan)

Thinkific is a cloud-based learning management system for hosting online classes. It offers pretty much everything you need for quite a low price.

Whether it’s content hosting, website building, engagement tools – or even email marketing… Thinkific has it, and their starter plan is only $39 per month. 

It’s even got a free plan you can use to get started.

Thinkific Pros and Cons

Pros:

• It has a free plan for beginners
• Free content hosting is included
• It also has decent marketing tools
• The membership sites look professional
• Easy to track progress
• Is affordable to host online classes
• Integrates with lots of third-party tools

Cons:

• The email marketing tool is not advanced – you’ll likely need an integration    
• The website builder is quite primary, and it looks more like a small library of your courses
• No blogging feature will make it harder to get organic traffic

Who is Thinkific Best For? 

Thinkific is best for two types of course creators: 

1. People looking for a free platform to get their foot in the door
2. Business owners are looking for a scalable, robust, yet affordable online course platform

In addition, Thinkific is also easy-to-use, which is why it’s an excellent choice for beginners.And at $39 per month for the basic plan, there aren’t many better options for the price point on the market. 

Thinkific Pricing

• FREE (Limited courses, No drip-feed content, no apps, etc.)
• $39 per month (No priority support, no private & hidden courses)
• $79 per month (Priority support, live lessons & more)
• $399 Per Month (Priority support, five site admins & more)

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7. ClickFunnels (best for sales funnels)

ClickFunnels is the most popular funnel-building software on the internet. It is known as somewhat of an all-in-one tool since you get a number of great marketing features even on the basic plan.

And that includes membership sites as well, so you can use it to host both free and premium courses.

The cool thing about using ClickFunnels compared to others on this list is that you will have access to advanced features, such as:

• Webinars
• A sales funnel builder
• Affiliate Management
• Email Marketing

Unfortunately, the email marketing feature is only available on the premium plan.

If you really want to use ClickFunnels, but you can’t quite stretch to paying $297 per month for the premium plan then you’ll be pleased to know that ClickFunnels has a lot of email integrations.

This means that you can easily integrate it with all the popular email marketing software platforms like Aweber, GetResponse, or ActiveCampaign, for example, while remaining on ClickFunnels’ lower pricing plan.

ClickFunnels Pros and Cons

Pros: 

• It’s been around for a while, so you know it’s not going to disappear
• It comes with one of the easiest-to-use sales funnel builders on the market
• Affiliate program management
• You can sell your courses via live webinars, or host them for your students                      
• You can share your funnels with other users (or vice versa)
• It has a lot of online training and marketing courses

Cons: 

• It is pretty expensive, especially for beginners, as it starts at $97 per month. And there are only 2 plans, with the next one being $297.
• The membership site builder is missing a couple of key features that some of the others have (such as engagement tools or advanced customization)

Who is ClickFunnels best for?

ClickFunnels is best for anyone who wants to focus on selling their course with sales funnels. What makes ClickFunnels the best option, in this case, is their advanced checkout options such as: 

• One-click upsells and downsells
• Two-step carts
• Order bumps

And the fact that you can build complex sales funnels where you can cross-sell different products or services.In this aspect, it even has the advantage over SamCart because it has a lot more options and templates for funnel steps. 

Clickfunnels Pricing

ClickFunnels has three pricing plans, but one is the Two Comma Club X: 

• $97 per month (Only essential features – no email marketing, no affiliate marketing, limited)
• $297 per month (All core features, extra educational material)
• $1497 per month (All core features, 10 sub-users, hours of additional FunnelFlix)

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8. Teachable (best quick starter)

Like Thinkific, Teachable is another cloud-based learning management system, and one of the most popular online learning platforms.

Like others on this list, it also has a free plan – although I wouldn’t recommend it because of the huge transaction fees.

But Teachable aims to give users everything they need to create and sell courses while also being easy to use.

What I like about Teachable, though, is that they also have lots of educational material or challenges that you can take part in. 

Teachable Pros and Cons

Pros:

• A decent set of features
• Excellent educational material
• Clearly laid out learning path for students to follow
• The websites on the higher plans don’t have Teachable branding
• The customization is pretty nice, so it’s suited for a wide variety of subjects
• The style of the courses is pretty nice, which could help you increase sales & provide a better experience to your users
• It comes with content hosting
• Issue certificates of completion to your students

Cons:

• High transaction fees on lower plans
• The lower plans do not allow you to remove Thinkific branding
• The price jump between plans is quite big ($29 to $99 to $249)

Who is Teachable Best For? 

Teachable is best for course creators that enjoy the feel of the software, and who also want to use the higher plans.

The reason I say this is because the lower plans simply aren’t worth it for two reasons:

1. The high transaction fees (up to 10%!) 
2. The websites won’t contain your own branding

Teachable Pricing

• FREE (Basic features, 10% transaction fee)
• $29 per month (5% transaction fee, limited features)
• $99 per month (No transaction fees, five admin users)
• $249 per month (20 admin users, advanced theme customization, and more)

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9. Skillshare (most affordable)

Skillshare is one of the most known but also unique ways to host an online course. Unlike some of the others on this list, Skillshare will likely send potential students your way.

However, because you will host your course inside the skillshare platform, the monetization options will be limited.

You won’t be able to add upsells or cross-link to some of your other products. Instead, you will be paid for having students inside your online course who pay a monthly fee to Skillshare.

Who Is SkillShare Best For?

Skillshare is best for course creators who don’t want to put too much effort into marketing.

When using Skillshare, you won’t have to rely on yourself for marketing – and you can focus on what you’re best at – creating and running courses.

Besides, it’s also an excellent way of getting your foot in the door when creating courses because you won’t have to worry about designing your website.

So, Skillshare is best for you if you don’t mind sacrificing some monetization opportunities to have less responsibility. 

Skillshare Pros and Cons

Pros:

• Skillshare will likely send you students, and you won’t have to rely on yourself for students
• The Skillshare platform is very popular, so your course will benefit from that
• You can earn money through royalty payments and referrals
• Skillshare lets you build your own 

Cons: 

• You don’t sell your course. 
• You’re always locked into the online platform and can’t sell anything from it outside

Skillshare Pricing

Here are Skillshare’s pricing plans:

• Premium Monthly: 15 per month
• Premium Annual: $8.25 per month. It is billed as one payment of $99 annually
• Team: It costs $99 per user per year

10. Thrive Apprentice (Best WordPress Course Builder)

Thrive Apprentice is a WordPress plugin that is part of the ThriveThemes umbrella. As this is a WordPress plugin, you’ll have first to get hosting and create your own WordPress website.

But compared to some of the other options on this list, it’s very affordable – ThriveThemes starts at just $19 per month and will give you access to all of their products.

Thrive Apprentice Pros and Cons
Pros:

• Very affordable
• You will have more control over your site than you do with any others on this list.
• It comes with a TON of tools to help you build your WordPress site 
• Your content will never be locked into a platform 
• It comes with an excellent visual editor
• Build unlimited courses 
• You can build and customize your checkouts

Cons:

• You will need to pay for (good) hosting as well, and Thrive sites are pretty heavy 
• You will have more responsibility with a self-hosted WordPress site (such as security, site speed, etc.)
• There are no monthly payment plans, so you will have to commit a year in advance 

Who is Thrive Apprentice Best For? 

Thrive Apprentice is best for anyone who wants to sell a course using their WordPress site. 

While hosting your course on a self-hosted WordPress site will give you a little more responsibility, it will also give you more control.

You’ll be able to run a more custom website on the front end and design the website however you want.

If you want to sell your services on the same website, that’s entirely possible.

Thrive Apprentice Pricing

Below are Thrive’s pricing options. This pricing is for Thrive’s complete suite of plugins:

• Thrive Quarterly: $90 billed every three months ($30 p/m)
• Thrive Suite Yearly: $228 ($19 p/m)

See all the Thrive Themes plugins here.

Online Course platforms: Final Thoughts

That’s it! I hope you have enjoyed my guide on the best online course platforms. As an online course creator, you actually have a lot of choices when it comes to online course builders.

In our opinion, SamCart is the best option overall – because it comes built-in, with what was initially just a sales platform, and for a very reasonable price. On top of this, it has a number of powerful conversion features that can considerably increase your revenue.

With SamCart, the course-building process is easy, and it gives you some excellent tools to sell your premium courses too.